"Budgeting"

Okay next to the word "diet", "budget" is the next bad word that nobody likes to say, think about, or do.  I like to call it Money Maintenance.  I like maintenance because you are constantly maintaining what you have available and fine tuning it as you go.  

With recently purchasing our first little home we found that we needed to better maintain our spending.  With a home comes unforeseen expenses/wants/needs.  So, we are going to the old tried and true method of the envelope method.  This is a method that everyone can use.  And there are many people out there that have written and taught how to do it gracefully.

Now, this is how we are choosing to do it.  What we do is each payday is leave just what is needed to pay bills in the bank.  The remainder we cash out and put into our envelopes.  We do this because we live in a world of debit card use.  This gets us all in trouble and broke faster than we realize.  So by starting out in a very simple, non complicated way, I list just four envelopes.

* Food

* Fuel (Gas)

* Misc. (Entertainment, Drinks, Clothes, etc.)

* Savings (reserved for any money left over after this pay period)

This is my simple way of trying this out.  I will say I have done this in the past.  Actually the first time I did this was on our vacation to Nashville.  We had $600 to get there, stay 4 nights, and drive home to Utah.  What we both discovered is that we not only had little money worries, but we had fun, spent freely, and came home with money left over.

I encourage you to try it.  Even if you start with just two envelopes and just $50.  Try it and see how it goes.  And please ask in my comment section if you should have any questions/concerns.  Remember, I am always happy to help!!!